


Darkness Falls - Epilogue Four - Recovery

by ladydragon76



Series: Darkness Falls [5]
Category: Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-26
Updated: 2012-08-26
Packaged: 2017-11-12 23:20:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/496786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladydragon76/pseuds/ladydragon76
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>Summary:</b> Before the remaining Praxians can even attempt rebuilding their city, they have to see what’s salvageable from their original attempts to preserve its history.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Darkness Falls - Epilogue Four - Recovery

**Author's Note:**

> **‘Verse:** G1/IDW  
>  **Series:** Darkness Falls  
>  **Rating:** PG-13  
>  **Characters:** Smokescreen, Prowl, Skids, Skywarp  
>  **Warnings:** AU like whoa!  
>  **Notes:** Here's #4, and the last of the epilogues because after her initial Alpha reading right after I finished DF in May, Masq asked, “Ok, but what about Smokescreen? What happened to the remaining Praxians?”

Smokescreen watched Prowl closely. Skywarp was their guardian today, and while Smokescreen knew that he and Skids got along, Prowl was new to the equation. Unpredictable.

Or rather, _too_ predictable.

Skywarp would be tolerant of a lot more than Starscream or, well any of the other Decepticon officers, but he would only be pushed so far by someone he didn’t yet like.

Smokescreen realized he was right when the section of history Prowl focused on first was the fall of Praxus. They only had Bluestreak’s firsthand account, and Prowl chose to read _that_ out loud. Smokescreen saw red optics light, and cursed under his breath. This was not the way to prove to the Decepticons that they weren’t going to threaten the tentative peace.

“That’s slag,” Skywarp said after Prowl read a few more lines.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me.” Skywarp crossed his arms over his chest, and slouched back on the console. “That’s total slag. I flew over Praxus when the city’s cannons were bombing it. Barely even pretended to aim at the fleet.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Prowl said, turning away.

It sparked something in Smokescreen’s memory, however. He’d tried so hard to reach Bluestreak, and he’d thought they’d managed to make progress from the delusions of nightmare versus reality, but now he felt a cold seep into his lines. “Given that we only have one witness account, it couldn’t hurt to hear Skywarp’s.”

Prowl glared over his shoulder, but it was Skids that actually spoke up. “That might be going a bit far, Smoke. We all know what really happened. Fine, the Autobots lost the war, and I don’t even think that’s such a bad thing at this point, but you actually want to give credence to lies?”

“Lies!” Skywarp stood instantly, and Smokescreen tensed. They didn’t need an altercation. No one believed that Megatron would side with a former Autobot over one of his own. “I can prove it!”

Skywarp stomped to a communications terminal, and only a moment later Soundwave appeared on screen.

“I need all the reports, planning briefs, and… slaggit. Gimme everything on Praxus.”

Soundwave was silent a moment, then his helm tipped, seemingly taking in the Praxians. He gave a short nod, hands working off screen. “Requested records available on archive terminal two.”

The terminal beeped, and Smokescreen tapped the controls to bring up the information packet. From the corner of his optic he saw Skywarp end the comm with Soundwave and approach.

“Those are the logs from the meeting where Screamer convinced Megatron to let us make a run on Platinum.” Skywarp pointed. “Then those are the briefing minutes, and then all the post-battle reports from everyone that came out. You can look at the time stamps, you can have whoever your top hacker is look it over. Those are the originals.”

“Why would we believe that those are true accounts? Age does not change the original lie,” Prowl said.

“Sure doesn’t,” Skywarp agreed. He straightened and gestured for Prowl and Skids to join Smokescreen. “You want the truth, or you want to tell future generations the same propaganda Sentinel fed everyone?”

“I waited outside those gates to search for survivors,” Prowl practically hissed. “I was _there_!”

“Yeah, well I was there before you were, or you’d be dead cuz I watched the security forces that _were_ there killing civilians as Platinum turned tailpipe and tried to run.”

“Do you remember, Prowl,” Smokescreen started, “how you said that Bluestreak thought _you_ were there to kill him at first. He even told me that others had tried. His nightmares were of security force officers trying to drag him out and kill him.”

“That’s-“

“You can’t deny it,” Smokescreen cut across him. “You can’t say that I lied too in my patient records.” He dragged a chair over, and sank into it, opening Skywarp’s report. “I can show you those. In the interest of history, and the fact that Bluestreak is deceased, I could do it. You remain Praxus’ elected senator. I think I could justify it without-“

“No.” Prowl sighed, and pulled a chair over for himself. “No,” he repeated more softly. “Let the dead rest. Primus knows Bluestreak deserves all the peace we can give him. I remember.”

“Our younglings died,” Skywarp said, voice soft. “We didn’t go to Praxus to kill more. We just wanted the slagger that did the killing. Don’t want any new sparks hanging onto our grudges either.”

Smokescreen looked over at the Vosian, and nodded. “After we get things moving along here we should start on Vos.”

Skywarp’s optics lit. “Thundercracker was into art. Starscream knows like… everything. He wanted to leave Vos, but he knew all about us and our history.”

“We shall have to recover all that as well,” Prowl said, copying the Decepticon files to his datapad. “For the rest of today, I’d like to focus on the Crystal Gardens. The crystals should still be there, but we will need to find all the information on cultivating them that we can if we are to bring the art back.

Smokescreen smiled at Skywarp, getting a knowing grin from the Seeker. “Sounds good to me. Skids, didn’t you have some stuff on that?”

Skids snorted a slight laugh, and removed a datapad from his subspace. “ _Some_? Understatement much?”

Smokescreen chuckled, glad for the break in tension, and stood to get to work. “Let’s go mechs. We got a lot of work to do.”


End file.
